10-13-02 - DREAM - I was working in a large company and decided
to go to the mall I was very familiar with.

When I got to the mall, I saw that some of the shops had been changed
since the last time I had been there.

The main shop I liked the most had become a book store and they were
displaying many books of Native American culture. The photographs and drawings
on the covers looked very life-like and real.

I met a couple people I knew well at the mall - first a woman I worked
with, and then Joe, who I also worked with, who was an ex-Navy Seal and a
hero in Vietnam many times over.

I liked Joe a lot. He was personable, extra good-looking as far as I was
concerned, and very intelligent - not only in book learning, but wise in
the ways of the world. He was an all-around male - able to discuss anything
men liked, but also appreciated women and had excellent taste in women's
clothing, hair, makeup and everything that made a woman look beautiful. He
was an excellent all around companion.

At first it seemed Joe didn't want to be with me, preferring the other
woman's company, but after a few minutes, she had to leave, so Joe asked
me to walk around the mall with him.

I noticed that the mall was closing down, and they were shutting the lights
off. Towards the exit, a couple other woman sitting near the door accosted
us and demanded introductions. I did so with first names only, so these women
couldn't track him down later.

It was during one of these introductions, I was shown the inside of the
woman's mouth, and that the fluid under her tongue is where Syphilis grows
and is spread.

It was pretty disgusting to think about. I won't need a reminder not to
kiss strangers after that sight.

Any sexually active person can be infected with syphilis, although there
is a greater incidence among young people between the ages of 15 and 30 years.
It is more prevalent in urban than rural areas.

How is syphilis spread?

Syphilis is spread by sexual contact with an infected individual, with
the exception of congenital syphilis, which is spread from mother to fetus.
Transmission by sexual contact requires exposure to moist lesions of skin
or mucous membranes.

What are the symptoms of syphilis?

The symptoms of syphilis occur in stages called primary, secondary and
late. The first or primary sign of syphilis is usually a sore(s), which is
painless and appears at the site of initial contact. It may be accompanied
by swollen glands, which develop within a week after the appearance of the
initial sore. The sore may last from one to five weeks, and may disappear
by itself even if no treatment is received. Approximately six weeks after
the sore first appears, a person will enter the second stage of the disease.
The most common symptom during this stage is a rash, which may appear on
any part of the body including trunk, arms, legs, palms, soles, etc. Other
symptoms may occur such as tiredness, fever, sore throat, headaches, hoarseness,
loss of appetite, patchy hair loss and swollen glands. These signs and symptoms
will last two to six weeks and generally disappear in the absence of adequate
treatment. The third stage, called late syphilis (syphilis of over four years'
duration), may involve illness in the skin, bones, central nervous system
and heart.

How soon do symptoms appear?

Symptoms can appear from 10 to 90 days after a person becomes infected,
but usually within three to four weeks. Symptoms are often not noticed or
are thought to be minor abrasions or heat rash and medical care is not
sought.

When and for how long is a person able to spread syphilis?

Syphilis is considered to be communicable for a period of up to two years,
possibly longer. The extent of communicability depends on the existence of
infectious lesions (sores), which may or may not be visible.

Does past infection with syphilis make a person immune?

There is no natural immunity to syphilis and past infection offers no
protection to the patient.

What is the treatment for syphilis?

Syphilis is treated with penicillin or tetracycline. The amount of treatment
depends on the stage of syphilis the patient is in. Pregnant women with a
history of allergic reaction to penicillin should undergo penicillin
desensitization followed by appropriate penicillin therapy. A baby born with
the disease needs daily penicillin treatment for ten days.

What are the complications associated with syphilis?

Untreated syphilis can lead to destruction of soft tissue and bone, heart
failure, blindness and a variety of other conditions which may be mild to
incapacitating. More important, a female with untreated syphilis may transmit
the disease to her unborn child, which may result in death or deformity of
the child. Physicians and hospitals are required to test pregnant females
for syphilis at prenatal visits. Tests of newborns or their mothers are required
at the time of delivery.

What can be done to prevent the spread of syphilis?

There are number of ways to prevent the spread of syphilis:

Limit your number of sex partners;

Use a male or female condom**;

If you think you are infected, avoid sexual contact and visit your local
STD clinic, a hospital or your doctor;

Notify all sexual contacts immediately so they can obtain examination
and treatment;

All pregnant women should receive at least one prenatal blood test for
syphilis.

** Remember that use of condoms may prevent the disease if the initial
contact sore is on the penis or in the vaginal area. However, transmission
can occur if the sore is outside the areas covered by the condom.

New York State Department of Health

Secondary Syphilis Rash

The second stage of syphilis is characterized by rashes that may have
a variety of appearances. The rash may appear as rough, copper penny
spots on the palms of the hands and bottoms of the feet; fine red dots; small
blisters filled with pus; slimy white patches in the mouth; or thick gray
or pink patches.

Late Stage Gummas

Small lumps, called gummas, develop throughout the body during the late
form of syphilis. Gummas appear as painless circular sores on the skin, but
may also develop on the liver, bones, stomach, upper respiratory tract, palate,
or nasal passages, causing pain, fever, tenderness, or tissue perforations.

MORE SYMPTOMS

How is syphilis spread?

Syphilis is passed from person to person through direct contact with a
syphilis sore. Sores occur mainly on the external genitals, vagina, anus,
or in the rectum. Sores also can occur on the lips and in the mouth. Transmission
of the organism occurs during vaginal, anal, or oral sex. Pregnant women
with the disease can pass it to the babies they are carrying. Syphilis cannot
be spread by toilet seats, door knobs, swimming pools, hot tubs, bath tubs,
shared clothing, or eating utensils.

What are the signs and symptoms in adults?

Primary Stage

The time between infection with syphilis and the start of the first symptom
can range from 10-90 days (average 21 days). The primary stage of syphilis
is usually marked by the appearance of a single sore (called a chancre),
but there may be multiple sores. The chancre is usually firm, round, small,
and painless. It appears at the spot where syphilis entered the body. The
chancre lasts 3-6 weeks, and it will heal on its own. If adequate treatment
is not administered, the infection progresses to the secondary stage.

Secondary Stage

The second stage starts when one or more areas of the skin break into
a rash that usually does not itch. Rashes can appear as the chancre is fading
or can be delayed for weeks. The rash often appears as rough, red or reddish
brown spots both on the palms of the hands and on the bottoms of the feet.
The rash also may also appear on other parts of the body with different
characteristics, some of which resemble other diseases. Sometimes the rashes
are so faint that they are not noticed. Even without treatment, rashes clear
up on their own. In addition to rashes, second-stage symptoms can include
fever, swollen lymph glands, sore throat, patchy hair loss, headaches, weight
loss, muscle aches, and tiredness. A person can easily pass the disease to
sex partners when primary or secondary stage signs or symptoms are present.

Late Syphilis

The latent (hidden) stage of syphilis begins when the secondary symptoms
disappear. Without treatment, the infected person still has syphilis even
though there are no signs or symptoms. It remains in the body, and it may
begin to damage the internal organs, including the brain, nerves, eyes, heart,
blood vessels, liver, bones, and joints. This internal damage may show up
many years later in the late or tertiary stage of syphilis. Late stage signs
and symptoms include not being able to coordinate muscle movements, paralysis,
numbness, gradual blindness and dementia. This damage may be serious enough
to cause death.

Can a newborn get syphilis?

Depending on how long a pregnant woman has been infected, she has a good
chance of having a stillbirth (syphilitic stillbirth) or of giving birth
to a baby who dies shortly after birth. If not treated immediately, an infected
baby may be born without symptoms but could develop them within a few weeks.
These signs and symptoms can be very serious. Untreated babies may become
developmentally delayed, have seizures, or die.

In its 1994 STD surveillance report, 4 the CDC listed the State of Hawai'i
as number 47 of 53 states and territories with a syphilis case rate of 0.3
cases/100,000 population. Among cities with a population of under 200,000,
Honolulu ranked number 62 of 64 with a case rate of 0.5 cases/100,000 population.
Although some rural states reported no P&S; syphilis cases in the past,
Honolulu will be the first city with a population under 200,000 to report
no P&S; syphilis cases.

Hawai'i currently ranks 19th in the U.S. in AIDS case rates. This relatively
high rate varies considerably from the low syphilis rate. However, these
AIDS cases were the result of transmission during the early 1980's when Hawai'i
exceeded the national P&S;syphilis rate. Hopefully, the benefits of disease
intervention activities and changes in sexual behavior which resulted in
lower syphilis case rates will carry over into lower HIV infection rates.

Mix human serum (blood minus cells) with cardiolipin and complement
If there are antibodies in the blood, the complement is used up by the
complex
If not, there is still free complement
Add sheep cells coated with antibody
If there is still complement left, they lyse
If all is used up, they don't lyse.

In other words:

If there is anti-syphilis antibody (anti-cardiolipin antibody), it binds
to cardiolipin and then complement binds and removed from the mixture
If there is no anti-cardiolipin antibody, the complement won't bind in the
first mixture and is still there when the sheep cells are added.

Modern tests

Monoclonal antibodies and fluorescence

PCR

Treatments for Syphilis

Mercury rubs since the 1500's

"One night with Venus, the rest of your life with Mercury"

Salvarsan (Arsphenamine), an arsenic compound 1910
And a less toxic form, neosalvarsan
Requires multiple injections and careful monitoring of the dosages

"Dr. Erlich's Magic Bullet" (Paul Erlich)

Magic Bullets

First "specific" curative chemical and foundation of all later chemotherapy,
including antibiotics
Age of optimism
Triumph of bacteriology (Koch, Pasteur, Yersin, - same era)

Remember the other diseases???

Methylene Blue and malaria!

Modern Treatment for Syphilis

single dose of penicillin for active, multiple doses for latent
almost 100% effectiveno resistance yet seen -- a real puzzle!

Contact notification and public health laws

problems with late stage treatment
autoimmune responses

Prevalence of Venereal Disease

Prevalence of Syphilis

Prevalence of Venereal Disease in General

probably 30% of the menoften higher in war time
effect on family

"venereum insontium" -- innocent syphilis or gonorrhea

Prevalence of Syphilis 1880-1920

estimates are impreciseperhaps 10% of the population of the US
Best numbers come from military

Prevalence of Syphilis (recent)

Effects of social attitudes on syphilis trends
not always obvious
note that cure (penicillin) does not mean eradication
gonorrhea is usually about 10-20 times higher

A major component of cell membranes is a substance called phospholipid.
There are a variety of phospholipids contained within the membranes of cells
including cardiolipin, phosphatidic acid, and phosphatidylserine. During
the course of some infectious diseases and autoimmune diseases, the immune
system may produce antibodies directed at membrane phospholipid. These antibodies
may attack cells in tissues or may bind to blood cells in the circulation.

Antibodies to phospholipids were probably first described by Wasserman
in 1906, who had developed a laboratory assay for detection of syphilis,
and later by Pangborn in 1941, whose laboratory assays for syphilis utilized
a prepared extract of bovine heart muscle which is rich in a phospholipid
that he called cardiolipin.

During the Second World War, laboratory assays for syphilis were being
performed on military and non-military personnel. Doctors discovered a number
of people with positive syphilis test results, but with no clinical evidence
of disease. In follow-up studies of this group of "false positive" patients
it was found that they could be divided into two groups, transient false
positive (usually due to an infection) and long term false positive. In this
latter group there was a high prevalence of autoimmune disorders including
systemic lupus erythematosus (LS). This was the first hint that there was
an association between "unusual antibodies" (which cause a false positive
syphilis test) and autoimmune disease.

In 1952, Conley and Hartrnann reported two LS patients with bleeding
disorders and a false positive syphilis test. In the laboratory, studies
suggested that there was a relationship between the presence of these "unusual
antibodies" and bleeding tendencies. Because the patient's blood did not
clot as rapidly as normal, the term lupus anticoagulant was used to describe
this clinical condition.

Today we now know the reasons for the "false positive" syphilis test
and the presence of the lupus anticoagulant are due to antiphospholipid antibody
variants. Interestingly, it has also been shown that this antibody is only
present in a small number of LS patients and that blood clotting complications
occur in patients with these antibodies, rather than the bleeding complications
one would expect from the laboratory results.

Although the actual disease mechanisms remain to be determined,
antiphospholipid antibodies can attack platelets or blood vessel cells which
may cause the formation of small blood clots.

The association between the presence of the lupus anticoagulant and blood
clots has stimulated the development of more sensitive tests for the detection
of antiphospholipid antibodies. Problems with laboratory standardization
of these assays have occurred but studies do suggest that prolonged increased
levels of antiphospholipid antibodies are associated with a potential risk
of both arterial and venous blood clots. Whether these antiphospholipid
antibodies actually cause the blood clots or are a consequence of some other
previous clinical event remains controversial.

For many years these phospholipid antibodies received relatively little
attention and were regarded by some laboratory workers as a nuisance (false
positive test results). Recently, however, the interest of the medical community
has increased due to studies that have shown a strong correlation between
the presence of these antiphospholipid antibodies and blood clots, decreased
platelet counts, or recurrent fetal loss.

The effort to understand the significance of antiphospholipid antibodies
has drawn together a number of investigators from various disciplines. For
rheumatologists it may provide new information about the immune system and
the formation of autoantibodies. Hematologists may be provided with a better
understanding of the mechanisms of blood clotting, and obstetricians a better
understanding of the mechanisms of fetal loss. Much laboratory research and
clinical investigation remains to be done before we fully understand the
role of antiphospholipid antibodies in disease. This understanding is a
prerequisite to the development of effective and specific treatments for
these autoimmune antibodies.

There were many factors contributing to the Holocaust, such as anti-Semitism,
Demonization, Versailles Treaty, economic displacements of the Weimar Republic,
but Hitler's mental health was the Direct Cause of the Holocaust. There is
circumstantial evidence that Hitler was afflicted with disease called "General
Paresis", causing his paranoia, megalomania, delusions, flight from reality,
and all those symptoms that provide the only rational explanation of the
insane killings.

SYPHILIS AND GENERAL PARESIS.

Mein Kampf- Hitler's biographical book is a good guide to Hitler's psyche.
One of the mysteries not covered in the Mein Kampf is why did Hitler not
serve in the Austrian Army. Hitler was born in 1889 and in 1910, at the age
of 21, he was subject to the conscription to the Imperial Austrian Army.
In 1913 Hitler left Vienna for Bavaria, without being drafted into the Army.
Hitler either dodged the draft or was found unfit to serve for health reasons.
Ernest Hanfstaengl- a member of Hitler's entourage writes in his memoirs
about Hitler's health problems:

"One thing that became borne in on me very early was the absence of a
vital factor in Hitler's existence. He had no normal sex life...It was part
of hidden complexes and a constitutional insufficiency which may have been
congenital and may have resulted from a syphilitic infection during his youth
in Vienna."

Syphilis is a very unusual disease, with unusual patterns. The first stage
begins after an approximate 3-week incubation period. During this stage all
symptoms appear; rash, breaks in the skin, sores, and a person feels generally
unwell. After a period of about 9 months, all the symptoms disappear, even
without any treatment, and the second, latent stage starts. In this stage,
a person is not infectious and syphilis can only be detected through the
blood test. The latent stage lasts from 1 to 50 years.

In the third and final stage - the tertiary stage the disease causes permanent
damage of parts of the body; ulcers of the skin, lesions on ligaments bones
or joints. Tertiary syphilis is most serious when it attacks heart, the brain
or the nervous system. When syphilis attacks the brain it causes the inflammation
of the brain, called "encephalitis". Today syphilis is a curable affliction
and it is almost extinct, but in the thirties it was quite frequent. In a
1930 published textbook "The Human Mind", Karl Menninger gives the following
description of syphilis:

Many people who have syphilis don't know they have it. Those who do know
it rarely suspect the possibility of its affecting the nervous system. Brain
syphilis follows original infection by many years. It is difficult for the
public to realize that syphilis far more frequently betrays itself by queer
conduct than by starting skin eruptions. Brain syphilis may exist for years
without being suspected by anyone, least by the victim.

When the sickness attack the nervous system it is called neurosyphilis,
and it can kill, paralyze or render insane. The psychosis caused by encephalitis
or neurosyphilis is accompanied by progressive paralysis, and it is called
general paresis. It is almost certain that Hitler caught syphilis in Vienna.

Because of the disease Hitler was exempt from the service in the Austrian
Army. In about 1914 the symptoms of the syphilis disappeared and the latent
stage started. The disease was not treated and the infection remained latent,
until it resurfaced in 1935, with start of the final tertiary stage.

It is also possible to pinpoint the date of this affliction. In 1908 Hitler
shared a room in Vienna at Stumpergasse with his childhood friend Kubizek.
In August of 1908 Kubizek went visit his parents in Linz, and Hitler remained
alone in the room, rented from Frau Zakreys. On November 20, 1908 Kubizek
returned to Vienna and to his amazement discovered that his friend Hitler
moved out suddenly taking all his possessions, leaving no message and no
forwarding address. Hitler vanished. "Unknown to Kubizek, Adolf was living
only a few blocks away from his old lodgings. In Austria every change of
address has to be reported to the police and accordingly on November 18 he
signed a police registration giving his address as Room 16/22 Felbergasse....The
new room had more light than Frau Zakreys's room and cost more money. He
liked the place well enough to stay there for eight months, living alone,
rarely leaving his room, speaking to scarcely anyone, and having no visible
occupation."

It is save to assume that Hitler's strange behavior was due to the syphilis
that was the cause of the break with his friend and the strange solitary
life. In my Kampf Hitler shows a tremendous preoccupation with syphilis.
Two whole sections were devoted to syphilis. Hitler wrote:

Particularly with regard to syphilis, the attitude of the leadership of
the nation and the state can only be designated as total capitulation. ..This
Jewification of our spiritual life and mammonization of our mating instincts
will sooner or later destroy our entire offspring.

In 1935 Hitler fell ill, he complained about cardiac pains, excessive
gasses and insomnia, but refused to be examined by a doctor. Speer writes
in his memoirs:

Hitler was never seriously examined at the time but experimented with
treating his symptoms by his own theories.....Later he was persuaded to undergo
an examination by Morell (Dr. Theodore Morell, specialist in skin and venereal
diseases).....The other injections and drugs he gave to Hitler were not generally
known; they were only hinted at. ... And in fact the injections had to be
given more and more frequently.

At the end of the war Hitler's health deteriorated significantly, and
there was a general opinion that Hitler suffered from Parkinson's disease.
In 1945 General Guderian, visited Hitler in his bunker under the Reich Chancery
and describes Hitler appearance .

It was no longer simply his left hand, but the whole left side of his
body that trembled.... He walked awkwardly, stooped more than ever, and his
gestures were both jerky and slow. He had to have a chair pushed beneath
him when he wished to sit down.

Hitler's armament minister and close collaborator Speer also visited Hitler
in his bunker in Berlin, and gave a more vivid description of Hitler,
sickness:

"Now, he was shriveling up like an old man. His limbs trembled; he walked
stooped, with dragging footsteps. Even his voice became quavering and lost
masterfulness.....When he became excited, as he frequently did in a senile
way, his voice started breaking. .......His complexion was sallow, his face
swollen; his uniform, which in the past he had kept scrupulously neat, was
often neglected in this last period of life and stained by the food he had
eaten with a shaking hand....I was constantly tempted to pity him......in
the hopeless situation, he continued to commit nonexistent divisions, or
to order units supplied by planes could no longer fly for lack of fuel. ...He
frequently took flight from reality and entered his world of fantasy....he
claimed he was in a position to conquer Bolshevism by the strength of his
personality and in alliance with the West."

Outwardly the symptoms remind Parkinsonism, a disease due to the degeneration
of the nerve cells in one part of the brain, usually as a result of
arteriosclerosis. It manifests itself in trembling and muscular rigidity
that interferes with all movements, from facial expression to locomotion.
It occurs fairly often in old age. Hitler was at that time 56 years old,
and besides the trembling and stooping he showed signs of flight from reality.
Parkinson's disease does not affect the functioning of the brain just the
motor coordination. Hitler's moodiness, flight from reality, fits of temper,
sulkiness indicates the disease to be general paresis, and very often paresis
is accompanied by the Parkinson's disease.

The psychological symptoms of paresis are megalomania, paranoia, and lack
of sense of reality, dulling of the moral senses. According to the Textbook
of Abnormal Psychology the paretic is extremely domineering, irritable, full
of grandiose delusions, and likely to feel that he is an object of persecutions.
Mentally they seem to be in a sort of dream world in which their own ideas,
wishes fears, and everyday occurrences are mixed up with no distinction between
fact and fancy.

.{The paretic} will be changeable, easily angered, sulky, have fits of
crying and wailing with self-pity....He will be careless in the face of danger,
lack foresight with respect to approaching difficulty, and be quickly reassured
after severe misfortune. ...Abrupt alteration of emotions is in common."

" As the disease progresses the motor symptoms become more and more
pronounced, The disturbance of speech becomes quite obvious...Movements are
slow, clumsy, and awkward...His gait is unsteady and shuffling .. His features
become flabby and expressionless while his voice is monotonous or tremulous.
"

Hitler's affliction and behavior looks like a textbook case, so exactly
it fits the textbook description.

DELUSIONS:

Delusion is defined as false beliefs, which cannot be modified by reasoning
or demonstration of the facts. Persistent and systematic delusions are
characteristic of psychotic states caused by General Paresis. Hitler had
many delusions; he considered himself the greatest military genius of all
times, the greatest philosopher, law giver, master builder, etc. Rauschning
quotes Hitler bragging: "Providence has ordained that I should be the greatest
liberator of humanity. I am freeing men from his restraints of an intelligence
that has taken charge."

PARANOIA

Another symptom of the General Paresis is Paranoia, defined as a psychotic
disorder characterized by highly systemized delusions of persecutions or
grandeur, suspiciousness, and hostility. Hermann Rauschning describes Hitler's
odd behavior:

Hitler has states that approach persecution mania and dual personality...
He often wakes up in the middle of the night and wanders restlessly to and
from. Then he must have lights everywhere. .... Sometimes Hitler wakes up
at night with convulsive shrieks. He shouts for help. .... He shakes with
fear, making the whole bed vibrate...Sweat streamed down his face. Suddenly,
he began to reel off figures, and odd words and broken phrases, entirely
devoid of sense. It sounded horrible.

Hafstaengel describes one of Hitler's birthday parties when Hitler lived
in a House owned by a Jew. At the party Hitler did not touch the food, and
this was his explanation:

But this house belongs to a Jew and these days you can drip slow poison
down the walls and kill your enemies. I never eat here normally.

MEGALOMANIA:

Megalomania is defined as extreme over-evaluation of oneself. Hitler was
a megalomaniac. When the Austrian Chancellor, Schuschnigg, visited Hitler
to discuss the Austrian German agreements, Hitler bragged: "I am the greatest
German in all history!... I have reached the most a German leader has ever
reached in German history."

SULKINESS AND CHANGE OF MOOD:

Hitler was known for his outbursts, temper and sulkiness. Wagener comments
about Hitler:

"[He] could fly into an indignant rage, whereby the vein on his forehead
from the top oh his nose to his hairline swelled and grew blue in almost
terrifying way, and his voice cracked , so it seemed that he would fear for
his life-and for our own as well....Hitler's mood fluctuated between blackest
depression and uncontrollable rage. Among intimate friends, Hitler let himself
go. I often heard him shout and stamp his feet. The slightest contradiction
threw him into rage. People began to be afraid of his incalculable temper.

He behaved like a combination of a spoiled child and a hysterical woman.
He scolded in high, shrill tones, stamped his feet, and banged his fist on
tables and walls. He foamed at the mouth, panting and stammering in uncontrolled
fury.

BRUTALITY AND TERROR

For Hitler terror, brutality and violence were favorite tools, and he
admired brutality in others, even in his enemies. Goebbels notes in his Diaries
about Hitler's admiration for Stalin's brutality: "The Fuhrer, incidentally,
has a rather high regard for the Soviet war leadership. Stalin's brutal hand
has saved the Russian front. To hold our own we shall have to apply similar
methods on our side."

CONCLUSIONS

In Vienna Hitler adapted Social Darwinism and the brutal outlook on life,
caught the bacillus of anti-Semitism, and got infected with syphilis. Those
three elements shaped his personality. His repressed sexuality found an outlet
in anti-Semitism that became the focal point of personality. Syphilis developed
into general paresis that caused his paranoia, detachment from reality,
delusions, blurring the moral restrains. Social Darwinism induced him to
seek solutions to his inner conflicts in limitless brutality and senseless
killing. The idea of getting rid of the Jews became the most important aim
in life, more important that the winning the war, and the conquest of Europe.

Even if we don't accept the circumstantial evidence of the of Hitler's
general paresis, all symptoms of extensive paranoia, delusions, megalomania,
brutality indicate a mental health problem that abundantly explains the
irrationality and absurdity of the Holocaust. In my opinion, this should
be the main theme of the Holocaust Education.

According to the Sunday Times newspaper, a British historian is about
to make new revelations about the love life of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. Robert
Service, professor of Russian history at the University of London, is reported
to have found private letters and medical records which show that Lenin continued
a love affair with the French-born revolutionary, Inessa Armand, for much
longer than is commonly supposed. BBC regional analyst, Stephen Mulvey, considers
the evidence available so far.

The theory that Lenin had a love affair with Inessa Armand is widely accepted
by historians, but it's usually supposed that this affair took place in Paris
several years before the revolution, and was not long-lived.

The new evidence reportedly gathered from Russian archives by Professor
Service, suggests that Lenin tried hard to end the affair with Armand, but
found himself unable to live without her. According to the Sunday Times Professor
Service is making a television programme that will be screened next month.
One of his claims is that when Lenin moved into the Moscow Kremlin in 1918,
he took both his wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya, and his lover (Armand). All three
had separate bedrooms.

Russians have long enjoyed speculating about the relationship between
Lenin and Armand, an advocate of free love. People have even discussed the
possibility that Lenin could have fathered of one of Armand's children. Some
have noted that Lenin and Krupskaya had no children -- and concluded that
Lenin was impotent. Others have speculated that Lenin might have contracted
syphilis in his student days. Most of these suggestions appear to be unfounded.

One thing that most historians agree on is that Lenin's life was
overwhelmingly dominated by politics. According to the author of one recent
history of the revolution, by the Cambridge historian Orlando Figes, "Lenin's
personal life was extraordinarily dull." He was an ascetic, like many of
his fellow revolutionaries. Although he acknowledged that he could be moved
by music, it was a luxury he tried not to allow himself. He did not smoke
or drink, and was not interested in beautiful women -- except for Armand.

But the evidence for a long-lasting passion is not conclusive. From the
fact that Armand had a room in the Kremlin, and believed in free love, it
does not necessarily follow that she and Lenin continued to sleep together
until her death from cholera in 1920. Neither is this proven by the fact
that Lenin was overwhelmed by grief at her funeral.

Professor Service's argument is, admittedly, strengthened by the fact
that Armand wrote a letter to Lenin just before her death. The letter itself
has been lost, but in a surviving covering note Armand declares that she
cared only for her children and Lenin. Professor Service believes it's
significant that Armand asked her daughter to deliver the letter to Lenin's
sister, Maria, rather than to Krupskaya -- suggesting that Armand wanted
to spare Krupskaya the pain of forwarding to her husband a declaration of
love.

It may be that Professor Service has additional evidence, which will be
exposed when his programme is televised. But for the time being his theory,
while undeniably intriguing, falls somewhat short of demonstrated fact.

SYPHILIS ISN'T ONLY FOR YOUNG PEOPLE

2002-04-04

OLD PEOPLE CAUGHT SYPHILIS IN ESTONIAS LITTLE VILLAGE

The doctors found six syphilis patients in the small district of Mikitamyae,
which is in Central Estonia. The remarkable thing about that is that all
those patients were elderly people over 50 years of age, the oldest of them
was 70.

The 70-year-old patient with such a sad diagnosis confessed to the doctors
that he had had a sexual intercourse with a woman of his age. This
happened after the couple drank alcohol beverages. As it turned out, the
woman, from whom the old man caught syphilis, was sick with this venereal
illness for several years.

Doctors found four other syphilis patients at the end of March. All of
them were lonely people in need, and fond of drinking. And all of them were
between 50-70 years of age.

1932:

The Tuskegee Syphilis Study began. Two hundred (200) poor black men with
syphilis began a long term experiment in which those men were to be studied.
They were never told of their illness, and treatment was denied them. As
many as 100 of the original 200 died as a direct or indirect result of the
illness. The wives and children of the subjects also suffered as a result
of the disease. (The government office supervising the study was the predecessor
to today's Centers for Disease Control (CDC)).

The Secretary of Defense may not conduct any test or experiment involving
the use of any chemical or biological agent on civilian populations unless
local civilian officials in the area in which the test or experiment is to
be conducted are notified in advance of such test or experiment...

This necessarily applies to peacetime civilian populations. There would
be no permission asked, or granted, of a foreign government with which this
nation were at war, for permission to experiment on their citizens.

And such test or experiment may then be conducted only after the expiration
of the thirty-day period beginning on the date of such notification.

It should be noted that no definition exists within that law which defines
who or what constitutes "local civilian officials". Under this wording compliance
could be satisfied by the notification of an off-duty meter maid.

The reality of 50 USC 1520 is that it is, on the face of it,
unconstitutional. The fourth article of amendment to the U.S. Constitution
clearly states, "The right of the people to be secure in their persons...shall
not be violated."

The most prominent application of the federal law, with which most people
are familiar, is the infamous Tuskegee Experiments. These were studies performed
by the United States Public Health Service (USPHS) upon 412 black American
citizens infected with syphilis, depriving them of a proven cure for the
purpose of a 40-year study of the disease's effect--which, untreated, is
nearly always death.

More recently has come to light experiments being performed, again on
black people, by the United States government; this time outside the restrictions
of U.S. law.

THE SACRAMENTO BEE, October 28, 2001 -A significant rise in syphilis
infections is being driven by gay men having unprotected sex with multiple
partners, according to city public health officials.

The number of infections more than doubled among gay and bisexual men
from 2000 according to a report city officials will deliver Saturday at the
Infectious Diseases Society of America meeting in San Francisco.

A LETTER FROM A GRANDFATHER TO HIS GRANDSONS ABOUT VENEREAL DISEASE
IN WW II

The world out there is dangerous, and some of the dangers are hidden.
Some of the most hideous dangers are what are called venereal diseases. You
probably already know the meaning of the term, venereal disease, but let
me explain the term anyway.

Venereal diseases are those diseases which are usually transmitted by
sexual intercourse (the mating act).

The Bad News: These diseases are not usually revealed to us. They are
hidden. For example, the beautiful girl or woman sitting next to you on the
bus or in the classroom may have one (or several) venereal diseases (abbreviated
as V.D.). The handsome young man, so strong and able on the football field,
may have V.D. Some types of V.D. can be cured. For other types, there is
no cure. Once you have them, they are with you for life.

The Good News: Keeping Yahweh's Commandments protects you from all types
of V.D. prevalent in the U.S.A.

While serving in the Medical Corps of the U.S. Army during World War
II, I had considerable experience with venereal diseases. Why? Because I
was an orderly in a hospital which treated only venereal diseases which plagued
our military men. We treated hundreds of cases. There are better and more
successful treatments today than then; but at that time, my job was to see
that every patient received his shots (in the hip with a long, long needle)
every three hours around the clock.

Never believe that a person (woman or a man) is "too nice" to have sex
with you knowing he or she has V.D. They do so all the time. Some for money,
some because they are angry, and who knows how many other reasons. Sometimes
these persons do not yet know they have V.D. They entice you; tempt you to
sin; to break the Commandment.

This may make you vomit, but one example I can name is of a Philippine
woman (a prostitute) who stuffed her private parts with toilet paper to stop
the corruption from flowing long enough to do her "trick." The service man
who visited her did contract V.D. Is this surprising? Later he came to the
hospital for treatment.

But remember the Good News: Keeping Yahweh's Commandments protects you
from venereal diseases.

There are numerous types of V.D., some of which I have forgotten, so
I will consult a medical book and name the most devastating ones.

Syphilis (pronounced sif-a-las): Until AIDS appeared, syphilis was the
most serious of all venereal diseases. It is estimated that one-half million
Americans (mostly teenagers) have this disease and do not know it. The incubation
period (the time from exposure until the disease develops) is usually about
30 days, but can be as long as two years. I have seen lots of syphilis among
our military men.

Untreated, syphilis can result in the breakdown of body tissues,
deterioration of the bones, mental disorders, heart problems, blindness,
and even death. Syphilis is caused by a little cork-screw-like, microscopic
demon (a spirochete) which stands on end and spins round and round, and drills
into the flesh where it multiplies in great numbers.

This disease is generally made known by open sores on the penis (called
genital ulcers), or ulcers may erupt on or in the mouth. If kisses are exchanged
when syphilitic sores are on the mouth, it is possible to contract the disease
in this way. Normally, however, syphilis is contracted only by sexual intercourse
with an infected person.

If untreated in its first stage (sores in the flesh), then the spirochete
eventually move into the bloodstream as well, and is difficult to cure. If
not cured in this stage, the spirochete move into the spinal cord. In this
stage, syphilis is usually incurable.

But remember: Keeping Yahweh's Commandments protects you from syphilis.

Gonorrhea (ga-no-ree-a): A common venereal disease, the incubation period
for gonorrhea is short; 5 to 14 days. Symptoms are painful urination and
the exuding of pus from the penis. Although this is generally not the case,
sometimes the pain is so great that grown men weep. I have seen much gonorrhea
among our military men.

But remember: Keeping Yahweh's Commandments protects you from
gonorrhea.

Non-gonococcal urethritis: This is easily recognized only in males and
manifests itself by a genital discharge. It does not respond to penicillin,
but must be treated with other remedies.

But remember: Keeping Yahweh's Commandments protects you from this venereal
disease.

Chancroid (shank-roid): The many ulcers which erupt on the genitals are
extremely painful and accompanied by swelling.

But remember: Keeping Yahweh's Commandments protects you from
chancroid.

Herpes Genitalis (her-peas gen-i-tal-is): The herpes virus, closely related
to the virus which causes cold sores, presents itself in painful clusters
of small blisters on the genitals. This is the second most common venereal
disease in the U.S.A. It can be treated, but NOT CURED. Again, there is no
cure. Once you have it, it stays with you the remainder of your life, and
frequently breaks out anew.

Now suppose you contract this disease by breaking Yahweh's Commandment
(indulging in illicit sex). Later you decide, "Hey! I have met the perfect
woman, so I'm going to marry her." Please be aware that in doing so, you
will doom this woman (the woman you love) to an incurable disease; a life-long
disease; a lifetime of pain, misery, and embarrassment. A happy prospect?
Not at all.

But remember: Keeping Yahweh's Commandments protects you from this type
of V.D.

Venereal Warts: These warts do not appear for many weeks after exposure
has taken place. Of all the types of V.D., this is, perhaps, the easiest
to treat; by cauterizing (burning them off). I have seen venereal warts also
among our military men.

But again: Keeping Yahweh's Commandments protects you from venereal
warts.

Candidiasis (You tell me how to pronounce this): A type of thrush; a
common female complaint accompanied by a vaginal discharge, soreness, and
itching, is a recurring one. Apparently this disease is never cured. Obviously,
males transmit this to the females.

But remember: Keeping Yahweh's Commandments protects you from this venereal
disease.

Trichomoniases (??): This vaginal discharge is caused by a parasite which
can be carried by a male and transmitted to his sexual partner.

Now for the Good News: Keeping Yahweh's Commandments protects you from
this disease.

The name of this venereal disease? I have forgotten, but it is a real
doozy. Also, I do not remember how it affects women, but in men, glands in
the groins become infected, swell, burst, and discharge pus freely. I have
seen this among our military men. This painful and inconvenient type of V.D.
can be disabling.

But remember: No need to suffer in this way because - Keeping Yahweh's
Commandments protects you from this disease.

AIDS: This venereal disease is incurable. This venereal disease is 100
percent fatal. By that, I mean it kills you - dead! AIDS is a KILLER. All
who have it die. The sad thing is: sometimes the incubation period is as
long as 10 years. This gives the wayward man many opportunities to spread
the disease, even before he knows he has the disease.

Now, suppose you break Yahweh's Commandment by indulging in illicit sex.
As a result, you contract AIDS, but no sign of it appears for eight years.
In the meantime, you meet the perfect woman and propose marriage. By marriage
to this woman, you sentence her to death, because she, too, will contract
AIDS. Is this what you want?

Once the disease develops and has a person in its grip, it sometimes
takes 10 years to die. In the meantime, even young men wither away from 180
lbs. to 80 or 100 lbs. Young men look 75 or 80 years of age before the end;
pale, withered, drawn, feeble, helpless, unable to care for themselves. They
must be cared for like small babies.

Why does this happen? Because some people refused to keep Yahweh's
Commandment: "Thou shalt not commit adultery (with women or with men)."

But remember: Keeping Yahweh's Commandments protects you from AIDS and
other venereal diseases.

In the proper setting and within the sanctity of Holy Matrimony, sexual
intercourse is a delightful experience, but the Book of Proverbs gives the
results of improper sexual relations. The foolish youth and the "loose woman"
are spoken of in this way:

"For the lips of a loose woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother
than oil; but in the end she is bitter as wormwood (a deadly poison), sharp
as a two-edged sword. Her feet go down to death; her steps follow the path
to Sheol; she does not take heed to the path of life;. . . (Proverbs 5:3-6)

And what is the "Path to Sheol?" Breaking the Commandments of Yahweh.
And what is the "Path of Life?" Keeping Yahweh's Commandments (Deut. 30:15-20;
Mt. 22:36-40).

"My son, keep my words and treasure up my commandments with you; keep
my commandment and live, . . . to preserve you from the loose woman, from
the ADVENTURESS with her smooth words. . . . I have perceived among the youths,
a young man without sense, passing along the street near her corner, taking
the road to her house in the twilight, in the evening, at the time of night
and darkness.

"And lo, a woman meets him, dressed as a harlot, wily of heart. . . .
She seizes him and kisses him, . . . and says to him: Come, let us take our
fill of love till morning; let us delight ourselves with love. For my husband
is not at home; he has gone on a long journey; . . . at the full moon he
will come home. . . .

"Let not your heart turn aside to her ways, . . . her house is the way
to Sheol, going down to the chambers of death" (from several verses of Proverbs
Chapter 7).

Now that AIDS is prevalent, these warnings of "death" can be taken very
literally. They are not an exaggeration.

But it is even more abominable and dangerous to become involved with
a homosexual (a queer, a sodomite). If we are to shun the evil and adventurous
woman, how much more the sodomite. The practice of sodomy is why AIDS is
with us today. Only one breaking of the Commandment (only one sexual contact
with an infected person) is all that is required to give you AIDS. The result
is death.

One final thought: Young people often believe "It's my life, so I'll
live it as I choose." But this is not true. Family members must be considered
also. They should not be subjected to the shame and punishment which AIDS
brings. Also, if a young person contracts AIDS, who will care for him during
his years of dying? Family members! "My son, keep my words . . ." (Proverbs
7:1). I wrote this letter because I want you, my grandsons, to be wise, discreet
and honorable, and because:

Many military forces before us have occupied the land of the Afghans.
Their mighty armies rolled victorious into Kabul and Kandahar. So far, all
those occupation forces, whether armed by swords, muskets or rockets, have
failed to control and hold those territories. All, save one. That was the
military, economic and cultural force led by Alexander the Great.

The United States and its allies have had success on the battlefields.
But, as the latest fighting there shows, we have further political and military
objectives in the land of the Afghans. We want to hold on to what we have
won. Our foreign policy gurus should consider the lessons of history.

As a political figure, Alexander was a ruthless and unforgiving pragmatist.
He was prone to bloody vendettas. He smoked out and tracked down his sworn
enemy, Darius III of Persia. There was no place for Darius to run or to hide.

Alexander was successful because he established urban centers of culture
and trade. Along his path of conquest, there were many cities called
"Alexandria." In Afghanistan, the cities of Kandahar and Herat were both
called Alexandria at one time.

These Alexandrian cities were cosmopolitan. Archeologists tell us that,
in one such city, artifacts were found from Greece, Egypt, Persia, Babylon,
India and China. At this site, just north of Kabul, they found a carved figures
of the Buddha, dressed in Grecian draped clothing. The pieces were inscribed
in both Greek and Sanskrit.

A city founded by Alexander was not a captive audience for all things
Greek. It was a home and marketplace for a diversity of ideas, cultures and
imported goods. Who would continue to follow Darius, when Alexander offered
a better deal?

But Alexander was ultimately defeated by epilepsy, syphilis and madness.
As his illness progressed, he became more ambitious, greedy and cruel. Bouts
of erratic and violent behavior replaced pragmatism. He killed one of his
top advisers in a drunken brawl over a trinket or two at a party.

In the end, winter weather in the mountains of the Hindu Kush ended his
march to the East. His generals would no longer follow his commands. In 323
BC, Alexander died.

After Alexander's death, the lands that he had conquered were partitioned.
Those lands were ruled by warlords who had once been Alexander's generals.
Most of those were exceptional military leaders but poor civil administrators.
The empire crumbled as a result.

This is what we can learn from the successes and failures of Alexander
the Great:

÷ Afghanistan can be taken by a military force. It can be held by
wise civil administration.

÷ The winter weather near and around the Hindu Kush can sap the
will of a military force. The rugged terrain with its cold winds and its
dust is itself a force that can defeat the armies of the imprudent and the
greedy.

÷ Alexander's successors lost the empire. Control of an area is
not measured in terms of square kilometers. Military occupation, in and of
itself, is a poor political strategy and usually encourages resistance and
sabotage. On the other hand, effective administration that delegates authority,
doles out rewards to friends and punishments to enemies can tame the most
hostile of populations.

÷ A military force should concentrate on liberating an area: bringing
in food, medicine, education and local autonomy. A society that permits diversity
also discourages resistance and sabotage. Liberated people will not harbor
their former tormentors.

Instead of wondering how to build a new nation in the land of the Afghans,
we should concentrate on distributing healthy food and offering shelter,
building roads, hospitals, schools and libraries. That is what worked well
for Alexander the Great. Organizations like CARE, UNICEF, Habitat for Humanity
and Doctors Without Boarders should be part of the vanguard.

Alexander, for all his flaws, proved one thing: If we can build the cities,
the citizens will build the nation.

Transmission of syphilis in the Greater Manchester outbreak, first recognised
in 1999 (1) is continuing. Since the last update in October 2000 (2), the
total number of cases identified has nearly doubled (from 53 to 104), with
the highest number of new cases being diagnosed in January 2001. Seventy-four
per cent of the 51 new cases were diagnosed as either primary or secondary
syphilis and therefore considered infectious (figure). Several cases of early
latent (non-infectious) syphilis have also been diagnosed since October 2000.
The outbreak continues to be concentrated in men who have sex with men, with
87% of new cases describing themselves as being 'exclusively homosexual.'

The continuing rise in infectious cases suggests that initial interventions
to control the outbreak, including distribution of free condom packs (with
enclosed syphilis alert cards), outreach education, and posters displayed
at gay events were not successful in halting transmission. As a result, renewed
efforts at targeted health promotion and screening were initiated on 14 February.
One such intervention included the introduction of a weekly early evening
clinic located within the gay village which provided free syphilis screening
on site, and regular peer outreach and counselling by members of the Lesbian
and Gay Foundation. Seventy-six people were approached in bars in the first
three weeks of the scheme and asked to complete a short questionnaire about
syphilis awareness. The data suggest comparatively high awareness of syphilis
with poor interest in taking up sexual health screening. Sixty-eight per
cent of respondents were aware of a local increase in syphilis, 85% were
aware that symptoms did not always accompany ongoing infection, and 80% were
aware that syphilis was easily treatable. Nevertheless, only 36% were interested
in free screening, and only two people attended the outreach clinic for testing.
Possible reasons for the poor uptake include ignorance of the outreach
clinics existence, and low perceived risk of acquiring syphilis. A
poster campaign is continuing and the screening clinic is still available.

Similar outbreaks of syphilis among homosexual men have been reported
in other sites in the United Kingdom and mainland Europe (2,3). Recently,
an outbreak of 63 cases of infectious syphilis, 87% of whom were homosexually
active men, was reported in Dublin (4). A large-scale publicity campaign
was launched in January and the number of gay men presenting for sexual health
screens at their local genitourinary medicine clinics has risen noticeably.

As syphilis shares modes of transmission with, and can facilitate the
transmission of, HIV infection, these outbreaks may herald a subsequent rise
in the incidence of HIV in the worst affected areas, particularly among gay
and bisexual men. This highlights the importance of evaluating interventions
to improve their effectiveness, maintaining heightened awareness and continuing
to develop relevant and appropriate interventions among those at greatest
risk. Enhanced syphilis surveillance is continuing locally.

BERLIN (Reuters Health) - Syphilis is on the rise in Germany, and the
situation among homosexual men is being described as epidemic by the Robert
Koch Institute (RKI) here, which compiles national medical statistics.

Overall, rates for the first half of this year are around 50% higher than
for the same period last year, with the increase attributed to additional
cases among homosexual men, according to a report from the Institute. The
number of heterosexual infections has remained constant, however.

The syphilis registration rates between 1995 and 2000 were constant at
between 1,120 and 1,150 a year nationally. There were 1,102 cases in the
first half of 2002, 50% higher than the same time last year.

The most recent figures suggest homosexual men are those most likely to
get syphilis.

"One has to conclude that around 60% of all registered cases of syphilis
in Germany at the moment have been contracted via sexual contact between
men," the report states.

"The incidence of syphilis within this population group, which accounts
for between 2% and 4% of adult men, is thus several times higher than in
the rest of the population. In the most hardest hit age group of homosexual
men aged between 30 to 39, the infection rate is around 100 per 100,000,
and as the epidemic is mostly concentrated in cities, regional rates can
be far higher," it continues.

The report's authors note that other west European nations and North America
have also seen syphilis increases among gay men.

"This development will probably be interpreted by doctors and scientists
as well as by the media, as the result of declining rates of safer sex in
the light of better treatment for HIV/AIDS leading to people feeling safer,"
according to the report.

"But although in Germany there is some data to show a slight reduction
in condom use by homosexual men when having anal sex, this is not enough
to explain the data and information that the RKI has on a dramatic rise in
syphilis. There has also been to date no clear increase in new HIV rates
among homosexual men."

The report, written by Dr. Osama Hamouda of the RKI, calls for a re-think
in tracking sexually transmitted diseases and notes that initial data from
a pilot study suggests syphilis could be spread by oral sexual contact.

Published June 1995 in Land Rights Queensland Palm Island's syphilis
catastrophe -- involving infection at some time of over half the island's
population, including 60 percent of its pregnant women -- demanded a full
medical, educational, and economic response, a leading microbiologist has
warned.

The Queensland Greens said the figures, which found syphilis in 'hyper-
endemic' proportions on the island, showed 'a heinous failure' of state health
and education services over many years.

In June, microbiologist Dr Stephen Graves released a study which found
syphilis endemic in three Indigenous communities in 1994-95.

At Palm Island, the study found 11 percent of the population currently
had syphilis, as did 21 percent of people at Doomadgee, and 17 percent of
those at Mornington Island.

This compared to a rate of 0.2 percent in Townsville's population.

Dr Graves said of those tested, only 39 percent of Palm Islanders had
never contracted the disease, compared to 92 percent of Townsville's
population.

He found the infection rate had decreased marginally since 1993, when
16 percent of islanders were found to have the disease.

He said his Doomadgee and Mornington Island findings involved smaller
samples and were less statistically reliable than Palm Island figures.

In his 1994-95 study, Dr Graves found 10.5 percent of the island's pregnant
women had active infections, and a staggering 60.5 percent of those women
had in the past contracted syphilis.

Dr Graves conducted the study while working as a microbiologist at Townsville
General Hospital. He is now director of microbiology at Geelong Hospital
in Victoria.

He said it was time the public knew what authorities had known for about
10 years.

He said publicity of the figures in no way reflected poorly on Palm Islanders.
Release of the information was a necessary and responsible act in the quest
to eradicate syphilis and to save lives.

"No major health problem has ever been contained by people putting the
lid on it," he said.

Syphilis, which is transmitted during intercourse, causes a temporary
painless soar on the genitals of men and women, but otherwise there are no
initial symptoms.

However, left untreated the disease resurfaces years later causing mental
and physical disabilities, still births, and death.

Women infected with syphilis can transmit the disease to their children
during pregnancy.

But syphilis is easily cured with just one shot of penicillin.

Dr Graves said the most urgent need was for all Palm Island's sexually
active young men to have regular annual checkups.

He said the long-term solution was "not predominantly medical", but
"educational and economic".

Dr Graves has recommended broad based educational services on the island
including health and sex education, the enforcement of compulsory education,
and the provision of jobs through the spending of public monies where
necessary.

He recommended proactive sexual health services and drug rehabilitation
clinics in Aboriginal communities, and the routine screening of sexually-active
people.

"The community on Palm Island should consider a mass eradication campaign
with penicillin to get syphilis under control.

"There should be research into antibiotics to treat syphilis that don't
need to be given by injection, and research into a syphilis vaccine.

"A vaccine will be necessary to totally eradicate syphilis."

The Queensland Greens' candidate for Townsville, Mr Tony Clunies-Ross,
said the syphilis epidemic was "the tip of the iceberg", given the widespread
poverty on Palm Island.

"Water supplies and sewerage facilities on the island are designed for
a population of 1,500  one third of the current requirement.

"And public housing on Palm Island is in intolerably short supply, with
an average of 21-22 people occupying each dwelling."

The chief executive officer of the Palm Island Aboriginal Council, Mr
Jeff Warner, said the Queensland Cabinet had adopted a Health Department
document last year which recommended one health worker per 250 people in
Aboriginal communities  on Palm Island the ratio was still 1:1000.

He said the document recommended training for Aboriginal people to help
deliver health services to their communities.

Mr Clunies-Ross said the services recommended in the Cabinet submission
"were just not happening" on Palm Island.

"Nobody wants to accept responsibility for the 4,500 people on the
island."

He called on the state government to provide immediate emergency relief
funding.

Mr Graves said the Northern Regional Health Authority had allocated a
sexual health nurse to Palm Island, along with "contact tracers" to interview
infected patients so that their sexual partners could be located and
treated.

He said improved health services had led to a five percent drop in Palm
Island's syphilis rate since 1993 , but syphilis was still endemic on the
island.

Immediate checkups are a must!

The microbiologist who exposed the 'hyper-endemic' proportions of syphilis
on Palm Island wants all sexually-active young island men to have checkups
immediately.

Dr Stephen Graves said many men who contracted syphilis would be totally
unaware that they had it. They may be aware of no symptoms and would regard
themselves as perfectly healthy.

"All of Palm Island's sexually active young men must have check-ups so
syphilis can be beaten for good", he told Land Rights Queensland.

"For both sexes, syphilis begins with a painless sore on the genitals
which heals, but that doesn't mean the disease goes away  far from
it!

"Over the next three months, the disease spreads throughout the body causing
secondary syphilis

"A red rash then occurs on the body, particularly on the palms of the
hands and the soles of the feet.

"During this time, the person may have a fever, with muscle aches and
pains.

"This usually lasts for only a few weeks. These symptoms then disappear
spontaneously, and the disease becomes dormant for many years, in some people
for life.

"But that doesn't mean it's gone.

"In particular, women who feel perfectly well can still infect their babies
while pregnant, years after contracting the disease.

"Meanwhile, the disease works silently causing damage to may organs, including
the heart, the blood vessels, the brain, and the spinal chord.

"Mental and physical disabilities, and death result.

"Babies infected during pregnancy may die before birth, or alternatively
have syphilis at birth, or exhibit symptoms of syphilis later in life, for
example blindness."

Dr Graves said the disease could be cured with just one penicillin shot
 except in its final stages.

He said syphilis knew no racial barriers it was extremely common
in the white community last century.

"In the year 1900, syphilis was the second largest cause of death in the
white community after tuberculosis.

"Several popes of yesteryear, England's King Henry
VIII, Lenin, and Christopher Columbus all died of syphilis."Henry VIII had syphilis as a young man and infected
his first wife, Catherine of Aragon."As a result,
she experienced many still births and could not produce a male heir for Henry,
who then divorced her.

"This led to the British monarchy's break with the Catholic Church.

"One could argue that without syphilis, there would have been no motive
to form the Church of England."

Since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979, hundreds of
thousands of Afghans have sought refuge in Iran, either directly across the
Afghan border or by a long detour through Pakistan. Some are Shiites from
Hazarajat, the central, largely Shiite district of Afghanistan which has
been virtually autonomous since 1979. Others are Tajiks and Turkomen from
the northern provinces of Afghanistan. Many come from the neighbouring province
of Herat.

Between 1,5 and 2 million refugees

No one knows the exact number of the refugees. But the Iranian authorities
and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimate there
are between 1,5 and 2 million (compared to 2,5 million - 3 million in
Pakistan).

The refugees are dispersed throughout Iran. According to UNHCR estimates,
there are 600.000 in Khorasan province -- 250.000 in the capital, Mashad,
alone -- 150.000 each in the provinces of Isfahan, Kerman, Tehran, Fars and
Yazd, and 120.000 in Sistan-Baluchistan province. Many work , often for low
wages, in construction, agriculture, or in factories or small shops.

In 1979 the Iranians created the Council for Afghan Refugees (CAR), which
is part of the ministry of interior. The CAR has grown increasingly alarmed
at the growing number of Afghan refugees, and at the health and security
problems they pose. The council runs a dozen transit camps near the Afghan
border. Refugees arriving at the frontier, or found inside Iran without proper
papers, are sent to these camps. Only after a medical check-ip, and in accordance
with local manpower needs, are they given an identity card and allowed to
live and work in a specific Iranian city.

A few miles from the city of Sabzevar, the reception and quarantine camp
is, at first sight, rather grim. It is surrounded by a high barbed-wire fence.
But once one goes through the main gate, this impression is quickly forgotten.
On each side of the camp the refugees live in solid concrete shelters. In
the middle is a large area, with concrete slabs, where tents can be set up
if a large number of refugees arrive. The camp has a capacity of 5.000, but
there were only 500 refugees when this correspondent visited it in May
(1986).

In the centre of the camp are administrative buildings, which include
a clinic, a pharmacy, food stores, a baker and a mosque. The refugees are
dependent on the Iranians for their weekly ration of food (rice, peas, sugar,
tea, meat, potatoes), which seems fairly generous. But, despite the presence
of many children in the camp, there is no milk, which is in short supply
in Iran.

Often spending several weeks in the camps, the refugees, most of whom
are illiterate, learn to read in Farsi (a language which some Afghans and
Iranians have in common) -- the women and girls in the morning in the mosque,
the men and the boys in the afternoon in a neighbouring school.

The refugees poor health is a major concern of the Iranian authorities.
Owing to both the war and the famine in Afghanistan, the refugees often reach
Iran in a deplorable condition. Half the refugees arriving in summer suffer
from malaria, and tuberculosis is common. Dysentery is endemic in summer,
and bronchitis, pneumonia and measles in winter. There are skin diseases
and syphilis.

Some of these diseases have virtually disappeared from Iran. Their
reintroduction has cost the Tehran government a good deal: $120 million in
combating malaria alone, and $20 million to import insecticides, according
to one CAR official. Last year, the Iranians managed to halt a cholera epidemic
in Birjand. There have been occasional cases of leprosy. Ordinary cases (malaria,
dysentery, skin diseases) are sent to Mashhad, and the war wounded to Mashhad,
Birjand and Tayyabad.

The rate of arrivals varies according to the situation inside Afghanistan.
A new campaign of bombing in Herat causes an influx of refugees. Between
March 1985 and March 1986, 27.000 refugees passed through Sabzevar camp.
But there are no statistics showing how many came directly from Afghanistan
and how many were picked up inside Iran without papers.

South of Mashhad is the camp of Bardeskan, which is for men only. About
30.000 men and boys passed through it last year. At one time, 500 refugees
were arriving daily, fleeing the war and the bombing. We didnt know
where to put them, says Muhammad Reza Youssefi, the CAR official who
runs the camp. But in May there were only 1.200 refugees in Bardeskan.

They have similar stories to tell. Fatima Youssef, about 20 years old,
fled from her village in Hazarajat, with her husband, a landless peasant,
and 19 other members of the family. They reached the Iranian border after
a six-month trek, during which they survived thanks to the work of the women
who spun flax and sold it to buy food. Today, Fatima is a refugee in Sabzevar
camp with the other 11 women of the family. They were separated from the
men, without being able to explain why.

Gholam Reza, about 40, left a village in Bamyan province after his wife
had been killed and his house destroyed in a bombing raid. With his 14-years-old
daughter Zeinab and his two sons, aged seven and nine, he walked to Pakistan.
On the way, he says, they were bombed. There were so many killed and
wounded in our caravan of 50 families that one could not distinguish the
bodies of the dead and wounded. Afterwards they walked only at night,
until they reached Pakistan and then Mashhad, where he was picked up by the
authorities and sent to Sabzevar.

Ibrahim Mahmet, looking 60, has just arrived in Bardeskan. Born in a
village in Herat province, he left after the village was destroyed in a bombing
raid. Each bomb dug a huge crater, he recalls. After reaching
the Iranian border with his wife and children (nine of them in all) he was
separated from his family at Tayyabad transit camp. He is now impatient to
get an identity card so that he can go and work in the city.

Besides those driven from Afghanistan by the war, there are those who
come to Iran in search of work. Jalil Ahmad, 19, left his village in Herat
because of the war. When one goes to pick up dry wood, he says,
the Russians arrive and collect the people and the wood, and burn
everything.

But he adds that he is a Mujahidin fighter with Jamiat Islami and that
he got four months leave from his organisation to come to work in Iran.
At the end of my leave, he says,I will go back to Afghanistan
and hand part of the money to the committee (of Jamiat Islami) and the rest
to my family.

Jalil came with a group of 250 Mujahidin who do likewise. After spending
a month in Tayyabad transit camp, Jalil was sent on to Bardeskan. He has
a job in a brick factory, but he will be able to work for only two months
of his four months leave.

Ali Shamar, 21, a student in agronomy from Ghazni, also left Afghanistan
to make some money and help the Mujahidin. After working, legally,
in Tehran for seven or eight months in a paint factory, he went to Mashhad,
but without getting a permit from the CAR. He was detained during a security
check there, and sent to Bardeskan. He now hopes to return to Tehran. His
family still lives in their Afghan village, in an area which has suffered
repeated bombings. His own village, says Ali, was bombed four or five
times.

The Iranian authorities do not make any distinction between refugees
fleeing the war and those seeking work. The Afghans leave their country
because of the war, says Hassan Bashir, chairman of the CAR. If
there is a small number who come to Iran to look for a job, the war is the
main cause of their departure. We do not have a phenomenon provoked only
by the quest for jobs -- unlike the situation before the war, when
there were 600.000 Afghans working in Iran, immigrants who are today considered
refugees.

Ahangeran is one of the few permanent refugee camps in Iran. It is a
camp for Afghan nomads. Lying in a valley at the foot of high mountains,
some 60 kilometers from the Afghan border, it contains 1.200 tents and close
to 12.000 people, belonging to eight different tribes. At first sight, these
nomads continue to live in their traditional manner, in big black tents where
the women weave carpets. In fact, they have been reduced to misery. They
came to Iran with huge herds of 200.000 sheep and camels. Now they are left
with only 10.000; the rest were sold or eaten, died in the way or in the
drought which has struck the area during the last three years.

Wholly dependent on the Iranian government, which gives them food and
medicine and tries to provide them with some schooling, these nomads wait
impatiently for the coveted permit to work in a city.

If their movement within Iran is closely monitored, the nomads remain
free to go back and forth between the camp and Afghanistan, which is only
a few hours away. Accordingly, for the foreign visitor, Ahangeran serves
as a window on occupied Afghanistan, revealing the way in which the tribes
fight the Soviet army in Herat province -- an area from which there is little
information, owing to its remoteness from Pakistan.

Azim, 50, from Hadraskan in Herat, is a member of Hizb Islami, a Sunni
guerrilla group. He has come from the Herat area, where his groups
mountain positions were bombed by two MiG jets and six helicopter gunships.
His group of 40 Mujahidin were armed only with a Doushka (an old Russian-made
machine-gun), Kalashnikov rifles and a single RPG-2 rocket-launcher. They
also use home-made mines. We need missiles, says Azim.

The Mujahidins meals are frugal: mountain vegetables, dry bread
and whatever meat they can get by hunting. When the fields are burnt
by the Russians, says Azim, there is real famine. He is
planning to return to Afghanistan in a few days.

Shir Ahmar comes from Hadraskan. He fled the war with 300 nomad families.
By the time they reached Iran, all his animals have been killed. In Iran,
he works as an apprentice in a brick factory, making about 150 toman a day
($20 at the official rate). When he has some money, he goes back to Afghanistan,
where he is a member of Jamiat Islami.

A few weeks ago, Shir Ahmar and his group ambushed a Soviet convoy. Armed
with an RPG-7 rocket-launcher, he claims they destroyed a tank and two trucks.
Last year, he says, they captured a Soviet soldier called Andrei. He
pretended he had changed sides and fought for a few days with us, before
running away.

Fierce fighters in their own country, the Afghan nomads are sometimes
difficult for the Iranians to manage. CAR officials often give up any hope
of bringing them to accept progress. For the nomads, school is
the place from which their children were taken by the Russians and sent to
Moscow. They are reluctant to send their children to Iranian schools, even
though boys and girls are taught separately.

Medical treatment is an even bigger problem. Dr Nasrullah Hamraz, an
Afghan doctor working for the CAR in Ahangeran, describes how he was forbidden
by one nomad to put a stethoscope to his wifes chest -- and was told
to put it to the mans chest instead. When he needs to give a woman
an injection, he has to cut a small hole in her dress with scissors.

To induce the nomads to send their children to school, Iranian officials
at Ahangeran are thinking of handing over the school to six young Afghan
girls who have studied in the nearby town of Qaen. But the presence of six
young women in Ahangeran would raise as many problems as it solved.

After a long evening spent discussing these problems, an Iranian official
asks despondently how he can enforce some discipline in the camp. One
has to win the trust of these nomads, answers Dr Hamraz. And
to win their trust one has to bring them services. But that is
exactly what we are doing, says one of the CAR officials, and
to no avail.

There are other problems. Like all immigrants, the Afghans are accused
-- sometimes justly -- of a wide range of crimes, including drug trafficking,
the kidnapping of women or children, and so on. Faced with the growing number
of refugees, some CAR official wonder if the Iranian government is not creating
a time-bomb by accepting them all. We already have so many problems
with them, now that we control them. What will it be like when we no longer
control them, asks one CAR official.

Meanwhile, despite these problems and the continuing Iran-Iraq war which
is putting heavy pressure on the Iranian economy, the Tehran government continues
to welcome new Afghan refugees.

The direct cost of the assistance has been high -- $40 million a year,
according to Hassan Bashir, the chairman of the CAR. That does not include
indirect cost -- education, health care and so on. All Afghan refugees
are entitled to all the privileges of Iranian nationals, says Hassan
Bashir. They can work, they are allocated coupons to buy food at a
cheap price, they send their children to Iranian schools, and they get treated
in Iranian hospitals.

An official of one of the Afghan groups sees things a little differently.
It is true, he says, that Afghan children can go to Iranian schools. But
Afghans are not admitted to universities, which are open only to Iranians.
Nor do they enjoy the benefits of the Iranian health insurance system, and
hospitals can be expensive.

This is a problem for Mujahidin groups who do not have privileged relations
with the Iranian authorities. Groups which do not have ambulances hire taxis
to take wounded fighters from the border to Mashhad or Tehran. This is both
costly and uncomfortable. And no one takes care of families whose bread-winner
has been killed in the war.

As far as the situation in the camps is concerned, a leading figure in
one Afghan organisation comments: We are aware of the many problems
our compatriots face in the camps: the separation of families, the isolation
of the camps, the shortage of food: our compatriots do not get the same
allocation as Iranians. And the major problem is the permit to live and work
in a city. But we keep our mouths shut, not to make these problems worse.
They will last as long as we do not have an independent country of our
own.

Soldiers participating in the war against terrorism have shed many bullets
to oust al Qaeda network terrorists from Afghanistan. Undoubtedly, casualties
and gun shot wounds have forced some soldiers to shed blood.

"The blood used to help the injured soldiers in the war against terrorism
is exclusively from the [Department of Defense] blood donation program,"
said Col. Michael Fitzpatrick, the director of the Armed Services Blood Program.
"We maintain readiness in Afghanistan solely on the donations made by military
and DoD personnel in the Capital area region."

The Red Cross is providing humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan, but
is not providing to the blood supply in the area, according to blood program
officials.

"President Bush said we are in this war for the long haul," said Fitzpatrick.
"Blood needs to be continuous throughout the long haul. We must be ready
for another [Operation] Anaconda or in case we are attacked again."

The blood donation program sends some 355 units of blood per week to the
Middle East for Operation Enduring Freedom, but Armed Service Blood Program
declined to give detailed shipments figures because of security issues.

The DoD-sponsored blood bank, however, is strongly recruiting donors because
of the short shelf life of blood and stringent qualifications unveiled in
October. Blood needs to be maintained at cold temperatures, or frozen, and
lasts approximately 30 to 40 days.

The new blood program qualifications eliminate any service member who
was stationed in Europe or the Far East between 1980 through 1996 because
of the risk of contracting a variant of Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease, the human
form of Mad Cow disease. Donors are also turned down if they visited the
territories for longer than six months.

The tri-service blood donor program qualifications now exclude nearly
20 percent of the military from donating blood. Some local facilities report
25 percent deferments because East Coast personnel are more likely to travel
to Europe, according to Lt. Cmdr. Michael Libby, the deputy director of the
Navy Blood Program office.

"The deferrals have taken their toll," said Lt. Col. Steve Beardsley,
the laboratory manager and acting chief of blood services at Walter Reed
Army Medical Center. "They are based off of theoretical risks, but they're
absolutely real enough to warrant a stringent selection process."

Fitzpatrick, his wife and three daughters are unable to donate blood because
they were stationed in Europe from 1988 to 1991.

"I would prefer to donate blood," said Fitzpatrick. "I understand the
precautions, but will be able to donate again someday."

The program has focused its attention to recruiting more blood donors
in traditionally high donor areas. Blood donor recruiting is essential for
replenishing the blood no longer received by donors who now fail to meet
the qualifications, according to Libby.

"The national average of deferrals for civilian blood donation agencies,
like the Red Cross, is approximately 3 percent," said Fitzpatrick. "The military
has a much tougher selection process, but that doesn't mean the need for
blood is lessened."

Blood must pass nine infectious disease tests before it is eligible for
transfusion. The process includes three tests for HIV, three for hepatitis
B, two for hepatitis C and one for syphilis.

Armed service members who received the Anthrax vaccination are still eligible
to donate blood, according to Fitzpatrick.

The controversy surrounding the possible Anthrax vaccination side effects
does not warrant a suspension from donating blood.

"We achieved our goal of maintaining the same quantity and quality levels
since the deferrals started in October," said Fitzpatrick. "In two or three
years, we hope to have a test to determine whether or not [a person is]
contaminated with [variant Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease]."

Platelet donations remain in constant demand because of their importance
to medical treatments and their short shelf life. Platelets are used to treat
patients with life-threatening diseases, like cancer, and can only be stored
up to five days.

Every other Wednesday Robert Klempa heads for Walter Reed to donate platelets.
He's done so for more than over six years.

"By nature, I like volunteering. If someone else can use the product,
then it definitely makes it all worth it," said Klempa, who marked his 160th
donation last week. "There are people going through Chemotherapy who need
platelets. Donating let's me help someone who really needs them [in order]
to get better."

The 58-year old Klempa was deferred from donating whole blood because
he was diagnosed with yellow jaundice as a child. A friend told him about
the platelet donation program, so Klempa quickly asked if he was eligible.

"They told me I could donate and I have been ever since," said the retired
federal employee who ended a 41-year career in November. "Donating is a lifelong
commitment and I will continue to do it until they tell me I can't."

In 1991, blood availability played a crucial role in pushing Iraq out
of Kuwaiti borders, both medically and strategically.

Blood supply was monitored by Iraqi brass in an attempt to predict when
the United States would attack. Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf requested two large
shipments of blood, prior to any offensive, to confuse Saddam Hussein and
Iraqís defense tactics, according to Fitzpatrick.

"In Desert Storm and Desert Shield, we used 80,000 units of blood from
the tri-service blood program and purchased 20,000 units from civilian agencies
like the Red Cross," said Fitzpatrick. "In the war against terrorism, we
have provided everything ourselves and we don't see any reason to impinge
on the civilian supply."

The military, on average, donates twice as much blood as civilians, according
to Fitzpatrick. Commanders are required to support blood donations, according
to DoD regulations, but donating is voluntary.

"The motivation is different in the military," Fitzpatrick said. "We have
a sense of readiness and the support of commanders, so we are able to recruit
many more volunteers."

The DoD blood bank program, Beardsley said, is "a good example of military
people taking care of military people."

SOME GOOD NEWS

Syphilis : This venereal disease is not common in Arabs. It is uncommon
for an Arab to present with a chancre, though once in a way all the
venerealogists have treated a primary chancre. This low incidence cannot
be explained by the half hearted treatment, often given by some general
practitioners, for treating gonococcal infection. Often in the latter case,
penicillin is not administered and they are treated with broad spectrum
antibiotics, which have no known action on spirochaetes.

Hardly ever has any skin specialist or venerealogist seen a case of secondary
syphilis in an Arab. Also, hardly ever a case of cardiovascular syphilis
or neuro-syphilis has been seen in my clinic during the last fifteen years.